Ochs, Siegfried
Ochs, Siegfried
Ochs, Siegfried, German choral conductor and composer; b. Frankfurt am Main, April 19, 1858; d. Berlin, Feb. 5, 1929. He entered the Berlin Hochschule für Musik (1877), where his mentors were F. Kiel (theory), Joachim (ensemble playing), and Adolf Schulze (choral singing); later continued private studies with Kiel and Barth, and also attended the Univ. In 1882 he organized in Berlin a choral union under his own name, working in close collaboration with the Berlin Phil.; was known as the Phil. Choir from the 1887–88 season until being merged with the chorus of the Berlin Hochschule für Musik (1920), where Ochs served as director of the oratorio dept. He publ. Der deutsche Gesangverein (4 vols., Berlin, 1923–28) and Über die Art, Musik zu Hören (Berlin, 1926), as well as an autobiography, Geschehenes, Gesehenes (Leipzig, 1922). Among his works were a comic opera, Im Namen des Gesetzes (Hamburg, Nov. 3, 1888), 2 operettas, song cycles, and choral arrangements of German folk songs.
Bibliography
K. Singer, S. O.: Der Bergrunder des Philharmonischen Chors (Berlin, 1933).
—Nicolas Slonimsky/Laura Kuhn/Dennis McIntire